Boxing is much more than just a sport. We can say that it is almost an art, also a discipline and a way of life. But beyond all this, the boxing is the way by which many young people manage to get out of their misery and I am not referring only to the purely economic, but to a life of abuse, discrimination, suffering. The gym not only instills technical ability to show off in a ring but also shapes the mind, promotes a healthy life, away from vices, educates in discipline and respect for both people and the rules. That said, we can see boxing as a social phenomenon that transcends borders, races, creeds, gender, ages, etc ...
Boxing, along with football, is perhaps the most popular, widespread and well-known sport in every corner of the planet. It is also the oldest, since from time immemorial the human being competed fighting and punching each other. It is the most individual and lonely of all sports, since almost all the others, such as tennis, swimming, wrestling, athletics, motor racing, motorcycling, fencing, etc ... have specialties for teams, doubles, and others . Beyond this, in the box it is not allowed to have a bad day. In any sport if you have that bad day, you just lose a match, race, or game, but you don't get hit or hurt. Most of you have a rematch the following week, the next day or at most next month, but in professional boxing a loss can mean from four months to a year waiting to return to the winning path and many times the revenge will never come.
In the collective unconscious there is a paradigm of what the life of a boxer is. It would go something like this: “a humble boy who comes out of the suburbs or a small town, generally illiterate or almost, very poor, growing up in broken homes, often abused both physically and psychologically. He guides his life by putting on boxing gloves and thus they unload their hatred towards the world, his anger and, by dint of destroying rivals, they come to amass a great fortune, to enjoy glory and fame. Probably due to bad decisions, vices, and abusive and unscrupulous managers, they finally end up losing everything and going back to where they came from ”. Well, those of us who have been in this for decades and love boxing, we have met and talked to boxers, we have put on some gloves, we know that that is a very simplistic and fanciful idea of what boxing really is.
By this I do not mean that on some occasions the sequence of events described is not almost traced. Sometimes it happens, but it is not common. Although many fighters come out of humble neighborhoods and homes, not all suffer abuse, many come from a good family, they choose sport out of passion and eager to stand out, not just as a lifesaver. It is also fair to say that the vast majority do not make it past an intermediate level. Of the number of people who join a gym, few reach professionalism; Of these, fewer still stand out and after 15 or 20 fights they manage to accumulate more victories than defeats. From there to obtaining a national or regional title there is a long way ... and fewer reach an international level. Of these only a handful will contest a world title and those who will be enshrined as champions are a privileged few. Many will lose the title quickly, and only an elite will remain for years as champion, achieving new titles and becoming a sports star.
This race is extremely tough and difficult, it is not for everyone. Mental and spirit strength is more important than physical strength, since the latter with effort can be achieved in the gym. First of all, if you don't have it inside you, chances are you will never get it. In short, the boxer is a communion between physical, psyche, spirit, heart and circumstances. The more balanced this communion, the higher the boxer is likely to go. Being strong on several of these items but weak on one or two of them will lead us sooner or later to irremediable failure. The boxing gyms in the neighborhoods are a great tool of a social nature, to give containment, training and security to many children and young people and something more important, perhaps, hope and the possibility of dreaming of a better future.